What should the church think about nontraditional sexuality?

(title updated 2017-12-10)

Some years ago, when I was recruiting the next cohort of elders to be on our church’s board, I spoke with a sister I’ll call “Dorcas,” whom I thought eminently qualified. She declined, citing Tim Keller’s teaching that women are forbidden from the office of elder. I was quite surprised at Dorcas’s demurral, but wondered whether my ideas were more enlightened than hers, or just less pure.

Though I hate to disagree with Dr. Keller, I nevertheless undertook my own study of the issue, consulting other writers as well as the Scriptures. You can see the results here on my blog.

Fast forward to about a year ago, when my younger daughter Sheri asked me to consider a study regarding the Bible’s teaching about homosexuality. Was the traditional interpretation in fact correct, and is the 21st-century Church drifting away from the truth? Alternately, have we been wrong all this time, as we were about slavery for example, and are we due for a change?

Before going into my study and its results, I’ll summarize my understanding of the issue when I started out. A few points, in no particular order:

• In the beginning, God created humans male and female, as the Lord Jesus said in Matthew 19.
• The Law (the first 5 books of what Christians today call the “Old Testament”) forbids various kinds of sexual activity; I blogged about one such prohibition back in 2007, when the One Year Bible’s daily reading included Leviticus 18.
• Although Jesus affirmed some parts of the Law (Matthew 5:17ff), he revised other parts (Mark 7:5–7, 17–23). Hence it’s debatable whether the Old Testament’s gender-related prohibitions were confirmed vs. revised by Jesus. From my limited understanding it appeared to me that Jesus didn’t revise or amend any of those gender-related prohibitions.
• The above notwithstanding, Jesus never directly addressed gender identity nor sexual activity (or attraction) between persons of the same gender.
• It bears repeating here that Jesus did directly address sexual sins such as adultery, which he defined very broadly (Matthew 5:28); anger; covetousness; failure to care for the hungry, the alien, the prisoner, the sick. These sins are practiced very widely, even within the church—to our collective shame.
• I remember a conversation I had at that time with a fellow elder on my church’s board. Based on my understanding of the Scriptures, I asserted that God would never punish sexual activity by eternity in hell. My fellow elder’s reply was something like: “I’m more concerned with how we treat them here on earth.”

  I’m glad that we were in agreement regarding ultimate destiny, but his comment influenced me in the intervening years in the way I think about the Christian life. Jesus did speak of the world to come, but he spoke a lot more about life here and now.

Also, around that time, I read

• Jesus, the Bible, and Homosexuality by Jack Rogers;
• Wesley Hill’s Washed and Waiting; and, some time later,
• Justin Lee’s Torn.

The Rogers book I found wholly unconvincing at the time. I’m unsure what I’d think of it today.

Hill and Lee are gay men who have struggled with their orientation for many years. These brothers of mine desire to follow and obey and worship and serve God. They did not ask for their same-sex attraction; indeed, they sought to change their orientation. One passage in Washed and Waiting particularly touched me when I read it in 2011. Hill attended a wedding reception and got bulldozed into dancing with a young woman he knew slightly in college.

A couple of days later I explained to my friend Chris over breakfast what had happened. We danced, I said. I was with this beautiful girl. I was holding her hand and touching her back. Her dress was thin and showed every curve on her body, I said. I could feel her sweating through the dress, and, inches from her face, I could see every exquisite feature she had. “And, Chris,” I said, “I felt nothing. No attraction. No awakening or arousal of any kind. No sexual desire whatsoever.”

Chris nodded. He knows my situation backward and forward and wasn't fazed by what I was telling him.

“The worst of it,” I continued, “is that while I wasn’t attracted to this stunningly beautiful person who was my dance partner, I couldn’t stop looking at the guy dancing several feet away from me. I did notice him. I noticed his body, his moves. Chris,” I said, “I was attracted to this guy. All I could see and desire was another guy across the room while I’m dancing with this girl. This is so frustrating. This is what it means to be gay, and I would give anything to change it!” (133)

Poignant and painful, these paragraphs gave me a little bit of a picture of what it’s like to have only same-sex attraction. As I paged through the book, searching for this passage, I confirmed my impression that Hill’s view is the traditional one.

I read Lee’s book a year or two later, shortly after it came out late in 2012. As Hill gave me an idea what it’s like to have same-sex attraction, Torn gave me a picture of what it’s like to be in the Church as a gay man. As one might expect, it’s a mixed bag. Lee has some prescriptions for us all, whether or not we take the traditional view on same-sex attraction. I think these steps would be very helpful, and I hope this little essay is a baby step forward.

One thing from Lee’s book that shocked and saddened me was his discovery that so-called “reparative therapy” has never actually worked—as far as his investigation was able to find. He quizzed people about successful case studies, but none seemed to exist. In other words, the whole thing was wishful thinking at first and a fraud later on. Whether you believe Lee, or some of the claims in Exodus International’s wikipedia article, the organization no longer exists.

When Sheri prodded me to undertake my current study, she pointed me at video lectures by Gushee (I’ve lost/forgotten the links), which the lovely Carol watched with me. These presentations discussed the experience of LGBT folks in the church; I’m sorry to say that overall we have not welcomed them and we have not loved them the way Jesus would have us to do—independent of whether certain kinds of sexual attraction and activity are (or aren’t) considered OK by God. In hindsight, it was appropriate that my current study began with the more important question, viz., how are we doing on that new command Jesus gave his disciples? “A new command I give you,” Jesus said: “That you love one another even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this everyone will know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34–35).

That said, the question “What does God think about certain behaviors?” is still important, and to that end I’ll mention a few resources that I encountered this past year:

• Brownson’s book Bible, Gender, Sexuality
• Loader’s 2008 essay, What does the Bible say on Homosexuality?
• Two Views on Homosexuality, the Bible, and the Church (Preston Sprinkle, ed.), which folks have recommended to me; I’ve read only this review of it.

Brownson argues persuasively that neither the traditional interpretation (basically what I thought in 2013) nor revisionist interpretations (I think of Rogers, but it’s been several years since I actually read him so I’m not sure) are correct. He ends up pretty much saying what Loader says, but his argument is more comprehensive (it’s a book to Loader’s short essay). I’ll jot down a few things that I remember from it.

• When we protestants read the Bible, we make all kinds of judgments about what we must follow vs. what we need not follow today, following various kinds of logic. So for example, we discard the prohibitions against bacon and shrimp not only because they’re delicious, but also because Jesus declared all foods clean. The Apostle Paul also wrote a lot about this in Romans and Colossians.
• These arguments are not just about Old vs. New Testament commands, either; Jesus commended foot-washing. The Apostle Paul forbade braided hair and golden jewelry. He also commanded that men lift their hands when praying.
• To determine whether a particular biblical precept or prohibition is normative for today, then, we engage the text with some kind of logic or another. These we hope are coherent and consistent, and are not based solely on what feels good vs. icky to us.
• When we examine the prohibitions against sexual activity between two people of the same gender, we must try to understand how to interpret them. Are those commands like the Old Testament prohibitions of bacon and shrimp? Or the commands prohibiting sexual intercourse during a woman’s menstrual period?

  Alternately, are they like the New Testament commands to greet one another with a holy kiss, or to abstain from braids and jewelry? Or are they in the same vein as “Do not lie to one another”?

• Romans 1 seems to condemn same-sex sexual activity, but if that’s the common-sense interpretation of Romans 1:25–32, what’s the meaning of “you who pass judgment do the same things” (2:1)? The same things: what same things?

  Brownson explains it better than I ever could, but his point is that in order to explain the flow of the argument in 1:25 onward, the explanation must also say what 2:1–4 means. The rhetorical style seems to be that in 1:27–32, Paul takes the part of certain moralists of the day. Then in 2:1 he takes a sharp turn and shows why his readers must not just nod in smug agreement with the previous several sentences.

The short version is, Brownson convinced me, and Loader’s essay is a terrific shorter summary of part of Brownson’s argument.

But more important than a list of what specific sexual behaviors are permissible between which specific partners—about which reasonable, diligent, devoted disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ disagree—is the question of how we treat our neighbors (the subject of second greatest command, which is like the first, Jesus said in Matthew 22:38–39) and how we treat one another (John 13).

And that, as a former manager used to say, is all I know.

A few words on marriage. And sex.

We drove a couple of hours into the valley yesterday for a wedding -- the last remaining single nephew of the lovely Carol is now officially unavailable. Besides the important point that marriage is for "as long as we both shall live," the pastor gave the rest of us a short reminder regarding our duties to support the marriage: the point I remembered was not to ah, "talk steenk" (as we used to say as kids) about one partner to the other.

This could be a very poisonous thing to do -- particularly if we suspect there's some strain in the marriage. I mean, if "Don" and "Mary" might be having some issues, and we send Mary the subliminal (or not-so-) message that if she decided to dump Don, we could certainly understand, what with all the stunts he's pulled recently, etc. -- that could be a terribly destructive thing to do. (On the other hand, it could also be a brilliant support of the marriage, if we know for sure that she'll rise up to defend her husband from these unfair accusations, etc., but that's a risky proposition.).

Instead, we should remind each other that the vow is "for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health" and that it really is a permanent deal, a promise.

This morning I heard a brilliant sermon on "I believe in God but I'm in charge of my sex life," where our pastor reminded us of the concept of "chastity" and how it applies to all of us, whether single or married. He explained that the exhortation to us in 1 Corinthians 6:18 ("Flee immorality... ") was not because sexual sins are more heinous in God's view; it's because the consequences are greater upon me, the sinner. It's a helpful reminder to me about the importance of chastity -- I don't want to be hobbled in my pursuit of God any more than I already am.

Something else I liked from this morning's sermon was a bit of dialog between a young, "modern" person who expressed incredulity at the idea of saving sex for marriage. "Nobody's a virgin when they get married these days. I mean, were you and your wife virgins when you got married?" Upon hearing that in fact John and Nancy were, he replied: "No way! There is no way I could live like that!"

So John asked, "How's your way working out for you?" It wasn't working very well at all, as it turned out. Another pastor, Andy Stanley, was quoted as asking a congregant, "Has having sex outside of marriage made your life better, or just more complicated?" Just more complicated. A lot more complicated.

Not everyone can see the damage that's being done; some just enjoy the pleasure of the experience. But as Cameron Diaz's character says in Vanilla Sky, "[W]hen you sleep with someone, your body makes a promise, whether you do or not." Something profound happens there. "Casual sex" is an oxymoron.

Or, as Lauren Winner writes in Real Sex, "in Christianity's vocabulary the only real sex is the sex that happens in marriage; the faux sex that goes on outside marriage is not really sex at all..." (38). Don't take that too literally! Of course it's real in the sense that it can produce a child, that your body makes a promise, that it can destroy relationships and families, that it can produce intense pleasure. But it's out of place; it's wrong in a fundamental way because it's out of context.

So how does pornography affect ...

I wrote earlier that I wondered how pornography affected the sex drive of middle-aged men.

Part of the answer appears in Doidge's book, The Brain that Changes Itself, on page 104. For at least some men, "pornography... initially helped them get more excited during sex but over time had the opposite effect." Doidge explains further:

Pornography is more exciting than satisfying because we have two separate pleasure systems in our brains, one that has to do with exciting pleasure and one with satisfying pleasure. The exciting system relates to the "appetitive" pleasure that we get imagining something we desire, such as sex or a good meal...

The second pleasure system has to do with the satisfaction, or consummatory pleasure, that attends actually having sex or having that meal, a calming, fulfilling pleasure.

ibid., p. 108

What pornography does is like creating the smell and sound of a fresh, crisp apple (say) or the aroma of a juicy steak -- while simultaneously sewing your lips shut so you can't ever have the apple or the steak.

This chapter in Doidge's book is not for the squeamish. It is, however, a healthy corrective for the thought that pornography is a victimless crime. The victims are first the consumers, then their wives/girlfriends, and (though Doidge doesn't say so) to a lesser degree every woman they come into contact with. And Dr. Doidge isn't a preacher or a scold, though he does advocate healthier practices.

True confession time: If I could press a magic button and somehow make all pornography and only pornography disappear forever from the internet, I'd press it. You're probably thinking all kinds of things about what pornography really means, how could you possibly know what effects a particular image will have on a particular man, etc. But before you condemn me as a moralistic scold (I wouldn't be scolding, just censoring), read the chapter -- I mean the chapter in Doidge's book, not some Bible chapter.

Oh, and I'd probably start looking for a button that could remove pornography from any other electronic media because of my own weakness, which I know is not uniquely mine. (The Marriott Corp. knows, too -- it gets them lots of money from business travelers and their employers.)

I'd do it for the same reason I'm against cigarette advertising targeted at kids (or at anyone else for that matter): that a society has a duty to its less capable members to protect them from those who want to exploit them. And don't kid yourself--a man addicted to pornography is no master of himself, any more than some teen-ager is when s/he gets hooked on cigarettes of any kind.

neglecting this blog...

After an encounter with Labberton's book on worship, I posted this piece on "waywords"; this morning I finally got around to posting this on comparisons.

But what's going on around here? The kids are gone to college, which brings a set of changes to the house. On the plus side, when I make suggestive remarks about the lovely Carol's body, I get only one pair of rolling eyes rather than three. Also, if the front blinds are closed, we can walk around the house without being fully covered. (I don't think the dog gets offended.)

On the negative side, we don't get to see the kids' faces, we don't hear their laughter or the animated conversations they have with their friends, we don't know so much about how their days went, when they've been out (or with whom), etc. It is sometimes very quiet around here.

But that's what we raised them for, isn't it? So they could go out on their own? Didn't we encourage them to go to a residential college rather than Canada or Skyline or CSM or Foothill? Yeah, that helps a little. But it's still too quiet around here sometimes.

Questions for couples

I have some useful questions for couples that are married or might soon be, but first a confession:

Readers might think that I have a perfect relationship with the lovely Carol, or that things are always smooth between us. This is not so; we have our share of struggles. We've said things we wish we could take back, and sometimes things are very uncomfortable. Marriage takes work, and sometimes help is needed from a counselor.

We visited one a few weeks ago, and I wrote down some of the questions we discussed:

1. What works well in your relationship? What do you wish were different?
2. What are three adjectives that describe your parents' relationship as a couple? Do you admire that relationship?
3. Who are your models for what it means to spend time together as a couple?
4. What are your models for resolving conflicts in an intimate relationship?

Obviously variations and extensions are possible -- how did your parents resolve conflicts, what adjectives describe the couple(s) you cited in #3 or #4, etc?

These were great questions for us. #1 for example gave me a chance to enumerate some things I love about our marriage: we smile a lot, I get a kiss in the morning and when I come home, she keeps the house tidy, she listens to me and cares about me, she's a great cook, I love discussing ideas (from books and articles) with her, etc. I didn't mention that I really like the shape of her body (which I do) or, uh, well, I'll stop there.

#3 was also good, because her parents had a different model of spending time together than mine do. That just might have some impact on how each of us thinks about that aspect of relationships.

Though we've been married almost 23 years, I don't think we've ever talked about how our parents' relationships worked, what we liked about their relationships, etc. Until now.

We also talked about what to do when things start to get uncomfortable, but I'll save that for another posting.

Putting the sexual genie back into the bottle

As a human male, I've been biologically programmed both to reproduce -- not just to procreate, but to get them launched; in other words, to maximize the probability that my genes survive me another generation or two. My wife and I are now closer to having an empty nest than we ever have been -- less than six months of runway remain for your younger daughter to head off to college, having become an "adult" in some sense (she's over 18).

And now I find biology asserting itself as strongly as it ever has. On a recent airplane trip, TV-like commercials appeared on the little seatback screens. In one, an ethnically ambiguous young woman was hawking a skin-care product, and I found myself drawn toward the back of seat 15C; I mean I was leaning forward so I could see the details on a digital image of this woman's face.

You've heard the phrase "reptilian brain"? I once held a gopher snake near a mirror, and she reacted to the mirror the way I reacted to the back of seat 15C: she extended her body toward that image. About half her body was cantilevered out toward the mirror! I didn't make quite as much of a spectacle of myself; I knew it was just a digital image, and my seat belt was securely fastened, low and tight across my lap.)

Then I realized what was happening. Here's how it appears to me: as my offspring need much less frequent involvement from me, there's some biological programming that wants to do the whole procreation thing again.

Some years ago, I heard and read about "The Jewish Sexual Revolution," which happened over three thousand years ago. This went along with the phrase "putting the sexual genie back into the bottle," which I understood to mean this: if men's biological (sexual) impulses are channeled/controlled (i.e., sublimated), all kinds of good things happen. Men provide for their children, rather than spreading STDs. They reason abstractly, they learn and think about the world, they write books, they teach moral precepts. (They also invent ways to abuse credit default swaps -- well, you can't have everything.)

So I'd heard the phrase, but I hadn't experienced it -- or hadn't realized it -- until now. Here's what I sense going through my head -- to the extent that I can know myself, that is. There's a resurgent desire to reproduce myself. That won't happen biologically, but I want my activities to have some meaning beyond myself.

I want so much for my life to count for something; I want to hear my Lord and Master say, "Well done, good and faithful servant."

Is it that the sex drive gets sublimated, and we engage in spiritual reproduction, philosophy, mentoring, and financial engineering out of a frustrated sexuality? Or is it more useful to think of the desire for impact and meaning as primal, with sexuality as an expression thereof?

Both may be true, but I believe the latter approach more useful, as it leads us to God for guidance.

Now I hate to disagree with Merton, but I think humans in society must follow God consciously in order to carry out his will (Ephesians 5:10, 5:17); I don't really think that "A man can live like a tree or an animal, doing the divine will all his life and never knowing anything about it" -- not for anyone reading this anyway.

Where am I going with this? I'm not sure, but something happened in my stomach lately and I wanted to tell you about it.

That made my day

I've been thinking lately about what makes for a great day. My inspiration was from a novel -- not a literary novel, though; it was... well, Tom Clancy.

In his 1996 book, Executive Orders, an Air Force sergeant, a steward on Air Force One, had a morning encounter with her President:

..."Any smokers aboard?"

It was the way he asked it that made the Air Force steward turn. "Want one, sir?"

The answer was somewhat shameful, but--"Yes."

She handed him a Virginia Slim and lit it with a warm smile. It wasn't every day one got a chance to provide so personal a service to the Commander-in-Chief. Ryan took a puff and looked up.

"If you tell my wife, Sergeant--"

"Our secret, sir." She disappeared aft to get breakfast, her day already made.

(p. 484)

I told the lovely Carol about that passage, how I enjoyed re-reading it, and she thought it was because that's my love language. Maybe it is. The following week or so brought these thoughts:

The sky looked right

Growing up in Hawaii I can remember only one cloudless sky; it didn't last very long, either. Where I live in California, the sky is often cloudless. You would think that after living here nearly 30 years I'd be used to it by now, and mostly I am. But whenever I look up and see clouds like these, it gives me a sense that whatever else is wrong with the world, at least the sky looks right. As it did today.

My day made at the office

There's a meeting scheduled for 7:00 tomorrow morning. I asked my boss about it

“No, I don't think you need to be there.”

Yesssss! That made my day. Thanks, Boss!

I opened the car door for the lovely Carol, and...

“There’s my phone! I see it--on the floor!”

Yep, she lost track of her phone a couple of days back. She’d thought someone else picked hers up by mistake, and it took some time to track that person down. When she finally did, today, no joy. And then, after having dinner out, we walked over to the car and... there it was.

A great way to start Saturday morning

I woke before the lovely Carol, and went to the bathroom; it was early enough that I headed back to bed, but late enough that...

She opened her eyes, turned toward me and gave me a warm smile. "I don't think I can go back to sleep. Is that what you wanted to do?"

It had been nearly a week. And so I was completely, and happily, under her powers. Need more be said?

And for today...

We got up in time to help set up at church, but before that, I scrambled some eggs with some leftover barbecued salmon. I also poured some leftover batter into the waffle-iron. Coffee, tea, and some (yes, leftover) steamed rice completed the meal. Fish and waffles? Well, it tasted better than it sounds.

We arrived a little after eight and got to work. Rod and Betty brought in an art display, and we spent a few minutes setting up the framework. It had multiple panels: five pairs of panels, each pair being a vertical stack, sort of like a capital letter H. Adjacent pairs of panels were attached together with Velcro® straps at the top and bottom, and a gasket-like thing in the middle. I couldn't reach the top, so I grabbed a folding chair. "We have the technology..." I announced. But a couple of tall guys took care of that using good old-fashioned reach.

We heard a great sermon about "freedom from hurry" (you can listen [MP3 audio] or check out the study guide [PDF]). I'll write about that too. But before the sermon, we were treated to a quote from Prof. Rueter of DePauw University:

Westerners live in the age of instaneity. We have instant coffee, instant replay, instant polls, and Instant Messaging--all in the pursuit of instant gratification.

http://www.collegenews.org/x4804.xml
Bloomington (Ind.) Herald-Times, August 26, 2005

Which reminded me of this really silly thing I heard: "I put instant coffee in the microwave (oven) and went back in time!" (sticker) I leaned forward and mentioned that to Steve. We enjoyed a laugh. After the service, I hung around the coffee machine; I ran some coffee drinks down to the small gym, and did the "barista" thing a few times. And I chatted with the others working there -- we talked some about the sermon as well as about coffee and logistics. One of the men told me about staying in touch with his daughters -- he sends them text messages frequently. What a great blessing! These guys are great.

We went home and thought about dinner: I'm in charge. The lovely Carol had picked up some pre-fab fajita beef -- pre-marinated, pre-cooked. Not instant, though, so I walked over to our neighborhood store and bought some bell peppers: red, yellow, and green -- to go with ¾ pound of meat. I also picked up a can of stewed tomatoes (best before March 1, 2009 -- whoa, better go back in time!) to make Spanish rice. I started slicing up the peppers.

The phone rang; it was the ex-teenager calling from across the country. We had a long talk; we got caught up, and we explored age-old questions of male-female relationships. There are no algorithms for this, but when she asked me for a number, I gave her one: 90 days. It was very sweet chatting with her.

It was time to cook. I got the "Spanish rice" going (it's not hard, but don't burn it before doing the "sizzling rice" thing), then resumed slicing up the peppers and half an onion -- next time I'll slice up the whole onion, not just stop at half. I fried up the onion in our cast-iron skillet, then added the peppers -- whoa, too much vegetables! I switched to a wok. (Yeah, right, preparing Mexican food in a wok.) But it worked great! Added the beef and kept stir-frying. The lovely Carol mashed up an avocado for guacamole. I pulled out a few tortillas (also from the neighborhood store) and heated them up in the skillet.

Dinner was served a few minutes after five. I popped open a cold one (a Bud if you must know -- in a can).

There are just a few pleasures in this life better than preparing a meal for those you love and enjoying it with them.

A passion tip for husbands

Gentlemen, here's a way to increase the passion (I'm talking human biology here) in your marriage. It only takes ten seconds, and you don't have to say a word.

Sound too good to be true? After I heard it at last weekend's marriage seminar, I just about slapped my forehead. "Duh!" I thought.

Here's how it works. Say you're headed into the kitchen for a cold drink. Or whatever. Your wife is in there doing something -- washing dishes, say. (It should be something where she isn't moving around much.) (No, I'm not going to tell you to take over for her -- but that might be good for another time.)

Walk up to her from behind (don't sneak up on her!), put your hands on her shoulders (ONLY her shoulders), lean forward, and put your right cheek next to her left -- or her right, your left. Squeeze her shoulders gently a few times (five would be too many).

After about ten seconds have elapsed from the first touch on her shoulders, gently release her and walk away. Say nothing. Go get your beer or coffee or lemonade or whatever. And wait at least an hour before repeating this whole thing.

This also works well if she's at her computer. Really, don't say anything to disturb whatever she's doing -- just a gentle touch, your cheek to hers, and after about 10 seconds, let go and leave. Just walk away.

NOTE: Don't step away if she decides to lean back into you. Or if she turns around and presses her lips onto yours. Or if she rips your shirt off -- but in that case, you really didn't need this tip, right?

Staying un-Pornified

I haven't actually read the book, but it was featured in a First Things article from January 2008. April's letters department contained this observation:

Pornography is everywhere....
    How many times can one man turn away from the billboard, shut off the TV, or throw away the magazine before succumbing to temptation? .... Before anyone will fight a war on pornography, they will have to acknowledge that there is a war to fight.

First Things, April 2008, pp. 8-9

And so the current issue of The Atlantic arrives with an article titled "Is Pornography Adultery?" by Ross Douthat. Now the Atlantic is hardly a proponent of a return to Victorian values or of conservative religious dogma (Hitchens is a frequent contributor), but here is a senior editor quoting Matthew 5:28 and arguing that "the Internet era has ratcheted the experience of pornography much closer to adultery than I suspect most porn users would like to admit."

Douthat covers various viewpoints on pornography, but he argues compellingly that the category of "cheating on your spouse" includes a whole lot more than extramarital coitus. It includes some of Bill Clinton's activities in the White House for example. Would it include "phone sex"? Probably. Staring at, meditating upon, delighting in the image of the "Playmate of the Month"? Ask your wife.

I mean really, if the husband's pledge includes "forsaking all others, to cleave to her only" -- then there's a whole lot of possible behaviors that would violate that pledge.

Douthat closes with this zinger:

Smut isn't going to bring down Western Civilization any more than Nero's orgies actually led to the fall of Rome, and a society that expects near-universal online infidelity may run just as smoothly as a society that doesn’t.

Which is precisely why it's so easy to say that the spread of pornography means that we're just taking a turn, where sex and fidelity are concerned, toward realism, toward adulthood, toward sophistication. All we have to give up to get there is our sense of decency.

"Is Pornography Adultery?" The Atlantic October 2008, p. 86

It was great seeing that in my favorite monthly magazine.

Now let me back up a bit...

...to the rhetorical question in the First Things letter: How many times can one man shut off the TV?

The answer came for me while we were still living in Japan (about a decade ago). My answer was: not enough times. There are things on TV, especially hotel TV, that I should not see, but I saw them and didn't always turn away.

From that day onward, I made a little rule for myself: Never turn on the TV when alone in a hotel room.

Does this mean I'm a chicken or that I'm prudent? Well, yes it does. Paul tells us to flee sexual immorality (not just "avoid actual physical adultery"). Therefore "no hotel room TV" is part of my plan.

And if you happen to see me while I'm traveling on business, or shortly afterward, would you ask me this please:

Seen anything interesting on TV lately?

Bella Is Back!

It had been too long since we took the—what, three-mile drive?—to Bella/Arrivederci on Seaport, overlooking the waters of San Francisco Bay. It was just the two of us, the lovely Carol and I, enjoying a late celebration of our wedding anniversary. She was wearing a not-entirely-opaque dress, which was just short enough on my side that, sitting next to her, I could reach down and feel her thigh without being obvious. Fortunately the opaque white tablecloths hang low enough that nobody could see what I was doing.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. When we arrived, there were colorful balloons and a big banner proclaiming "NOW OPEN!"

What's with the decorations, we asked. They had a fire several months ago, and just recently opened their doors. Smoke damage.

The place looked great. We arrived a little before six last night (a Saturday) and apparently the entire "front" section (facing the bay) downstairs was reserved for a banquet. So we had a rare chance to sit upstairs, right at the window. Before we climbed the steps, though, we noticed a special—chicken breast topped with eggplant (and some cheese?), in a sauce of Marsala wine, $17—which sounded like a winner.

Bread and butter, menus, and water all appeared. The lovely Carol chose salmon piccata (lemon and capers) and their homemade Minestrone soup. I opted for the chicken special.

She shared a spoonful of the soup with me, and it was great as usual. Our entrees came and they were great. Lots of garlic with the chicken—aw, I forgot to write down the ingredients! (You know, a man can never be too handsome, too rich, or have too much garlic.)

For dessert, we had cannoli at our waiter's recommendation ("Because it's fresh," he said). Terrific with a cup of strong decaf coffee.

Luckily for us, there was not a lot of traffic (word hasn't gotten out yet that Bella is back??) so we watched the sun go down and the waters of the bay turn silvery, then dark purple. We also read a chapter of Anne Perry's We Shall not Sleep as well as some articles from a recent "First Things."

Service was not all that quick, but then we were in absolutely no hurry either. (One waiter was covering the entire upstairs dining room.)

Great food, and we're planning to return soon, probably with the younger teen.

Last night

Last night, I looked at the clock. "Ten o'clock!" I said. "No wonder I'm so tired." Flossed and brushed my teeth, and fell into bed, lying on my left side so as to keep an eye on the lovely Carol, once she arrived. I closed my eyes briefly.

Pretty soon she climbed into bed beside me and turned on the headboard light. She pulled out a book. "I'm going to read something to help me set my mind on the Spirit," she said. "The mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace."

I love it when she quotes the Bible to me -- I think it's so sexy. That was Romans 8:6 I think.

But in this case I wasn't really paying attention; I was admiring the shape of her leg and remembering how it felt. I closed my eyes again.

She smirked at me. "You don't care about setting your mind on the Spirit?" she said.

In response, I reached over and touched her leg, setting my mind on her flesh. Then I threw a pillow at her.

Alternate universe

Some parts of Leviticus make me wonder what planet some of these people come from. Today's reading, which has a bunch of sexual prohibitions in it -- and there's a surprise in the middle of it too -- is one such part.

The Lord said to Moses, "Speak to the Israelites and say to them: 'I am the Lord your God. You must not do as they do in Egypt, where you used to live, and you must not do as they do in the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. Do not follow their practices. You must obey my laws and be careful to follow my decrees. I am the Lord your God. ...

" 'Do not take your wife's sister as a rival wife and have sexual relations with her while your wife is living.

" 'Do not approach a woman to have sexual relations during the uncleanness of her monthly period.

" 'Do not have sexual relations with your neighbor's wife and defile yourself with her.

" 'Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molech, for you must not profane the name of your God. I am the Lord.

" 'Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.

" 'Do not have sexual relations with an animal and defile yourself with it....

Leviticus 18.1-4, 18-23

There is a whole lot of other stuff in the parts I deleted -- like don't have sex with both a woman and her daughter, don't have sex with your sister or your mother, this sort of thing. What strikes me is that if I have this right, these were common practices in either Egypt or Canaan or both.

And right in the middle of all this is the prohibition against killing your children in a religious ceremony (a practice that nonetheless continued hundreds of years later). And the prohibition against male-on-male sex. And sex with animals.

The prohibitions are unambiguous, but neither does the Lord obsess about these things.

And now the question is: are these commandments like the ones about shrimp and bacon, or are they like the ones about murder and adultery? Did they apply only to the Jews, or are these commands for everyone? Or is the right answer that

verse 18 (wife's sister as rival)

applies universally

verse 19 (sex during a woman's monthly period)

depends on local habits

verse 20 (neighbor's wife)

applies universally

verse 21 (killing your children)

applies universally

verse 22 (male-male sex)

applies only to Jews

verse 23 (sex with animals)

applies universally

? Well, that doesn't look very likely to me. It seems more likely that this list probably applies universally -- that is, these proscribed activities are prohibited for anyone wanting to please God at all times -- rather than saying most of them are in that category except this one and that one.

Which of these should a pluralistic society try to legislate? Ah, that's a harder question. The answer in the US has varied over time. I'll go out on a limb and say that the state has a right and a duty to enforce the one about "Don't kill your children in a religious ritual," religious freedom be damned.

But as far as pleasing God -- it sure looks to me like this is a universal list. Not that anyone will go to hell for any of these things (a murderer on a cross next to Jesus went to heaven, right?), but for any of us that want to walk in God's ways, and want to know whether these things are displeasing, the simple answer is that they are.

By the way, I'm not writing about these because they're the most important issue when it comes to pleasing God, but there seems to be a lot of confusion and dispute about these today. And it did strike me that "don't kill your children" is in the midst of these other prohibitions.

"Rotarian" Jesus, dietary laws, and OCD

Some years ago, when I was living with Jon and Beth (a Navigator staff couple), Jon mentioned the phrase "Rotarian Jesus" as an impression some people have of our Lord Jesus Christ. As I understood it, this was the idea of Jesus as being a pleasant, urbane fellow, always polished and tactful. Smooth, but not in the sense of being "slick." Today's New Testament reading corrects this misapprehension.

The first incident we're told about is when the Pharisees and teachers of the law notice that Jesus's disciples ate without first washing their hands in a manner prescribed by some tradition or another.

So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, "Why don't your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with 'unclean' hands?"

He replied, "Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:

These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
They worship me in vain;
their teachings are but rules taught by men.

Mark 7.5-7

Not the kind of dialogue you'd expect at a Rotary Club meeting. Jesus explains how these Pharisees and teachers of the law contradict God's commands by elevating human tradition above the Bible. Is this the same Jesus who said, "Blessed are the meek"? Yes, it is, but both because he's fully human and hence may get exasperated occasionally (as he does with the disciples a few paragraphs later) and also because he's fully God and therefore holy -- his holiness implies intolerance of evil.

Jesus then calls the crowd back and explains further:

"Nothing outside a man can make him 'unclean' by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him 'unclean.' "

After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable.

"Are you so dull?" he asked. "Don't you see that nothing that enters a man from the outside can make him 'unclean'? For it doesn't go into his heart but into his stomach, and then out of his body." (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods "clean.") He went on: "What comes out of a man is what makes him 'unclean.' For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly.

Mark 7.15-22

There it is -- Jesus declares all foods "clean." But look at what's unclean. This isn't the seven deadly sins; here is a list of thirteen! As I look at this today, I notice something I haven't seen before. Jesus says that food doesn't make a man unclean -- that is food does not cause or create uncleanness. But then he says that the things that come out of a man make him unclean.

Does this mean that it's the evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft and so on that create uncleanness? I would think that they reveal uncleanness, or that their presence could be construed as some sort of demonstration or proof of uncleanness (thus "make him unclean") but do they actually cause uncleanness?

OK, after a little research, I think the answer is "yes," perhaps in a sort of ceremonial sense. The King James uses the word "defile" -- evil thoughts, etc., defile a person, whereas food does not defile anyone. The word can be translated "desecrate" or "make impure." Here is how I make sense out of this. Consider the issue of sexual immorality. Many (perhaps most) people have experienced sexual desire for someone other than their spouse, for example. Some have entertained such desires without acting on them. Entertaining those desires, meditating on them, cherishing them, is a bad idea, and may fall into the category of "evil thoughts."

But acting on those desires would undoubtedly make things worse. I guess the defilement was already there, in a manner of speaking. But actually carrying it out... If a man looks at a woman to lust after her, he has committed adultery with her already in his heart. which is bad enough. Doing it in the flesh does add to the defilement.

Come to think of it, there's a principle of battling OCD that says you can fight it cognitively and behaviorally; when you sense an impulse, say, to wash your hands when you've already done so, you can relabel it as an erroneous signal (that's the cognitive part) and refuse to carry it out -- that is, refuse to wash 'em (that's the behavioral part). I'm oversimplifying this but the general idea is that the more you refuse to carry out these impulses, the less often or less intensely they will come.

What we say and do will impact our holiness (or lack thereof). But not what we eat.

posted 2/25

Don't show me that stuff

Yesterday the lovely Carol went to the store and came back with some sweet snack food. She told me about it after dinner, but she added, "Better not let me see it." She explained that "if I see it, I'll want it."

This immediately came to my mind (but not to my lips; the kids were nearby): "Better not take your clothes off in front of me...."

Traveling daughters; traveling parents

I'm going to try not to write too much or spend too long here.

Our girls have been traveling. You already know I went with the elder teen, now almost (i-learned-the-truth-at-) seventeen, to look at colleges in Minnesota and Michigan. Here is my brief summary of that. You already know my impressions of the flight to Michigan, and our visit to Calvin College so I'll continue with...

• Kalamazoo College, in (surprise) Kalamazoo, Michigan. (The aforementioned friendly midwesterner thought we were visiting Western Michigan University, also in Kalamazoo -- but no, it was Kalamazoo College itself, apparently not well-known in Detroit. It took just just about an hour to drive there from Grand Rapids. We stayed at the Red Roof Inn -- Kalamazoo West. A nice enough place, but if I do it again, I'll stay at the Baymont, which is nicer inside -- your door opens into an indoor hallway, not into the snow-covered parking lot (-11°F wind-chill, that's about -24°C, ouch!). Baymont also has free wi-fi, unlike the T-Mobile that's "on offer" at Red Roof: $7 per login under 60 minutes, or $10/day iirc. Kalamazoo has great language programs, internship and what they call "externship", great study-abroad programs.

  We had a nice conversation with a Mr. Tavares in the admissions office, who graciously worked that Saturday to talk to us (or any other inquisitive visitors) about the college. He told us that the merit scholarships are renewable if you maintain a 2.5GPA. "Why do you suppose we make it so low?" he asked.
  
  Supposedly my girl is the first student in 3 years to come up with the right answer. Of course I think it's because she's a genius, but she says "they probably didn't go to the Reed [College] presentation before coming here."
  
  We took a plane (without incident) to MSP and spent three nights with Jan and Britton and their kids. I went to junior high with Jan, who I hasten to tell you is not as old as I am. She skipped at least one grade and so is at least one year younger than I am. I wouldn't want you to think she's as old as me 8^>
  

• Monday February 20 we drove to down to Northfield in plenty of time for the free food, I mean, for the opening session of "Junior day" at St Olaf College. A record crowd was there. Their academics, including the language and study-abroad programs, looked really good. The director of admissions is a great entertainer, but I don't hold that against the school, really I don't. Since our visit, I heard positive things about St. Olaf from at least 3 people -- mostly concerning the music program there.
  
  The chapel service was nice and the address by the president was good if rather liberal. Apparently St Olaf is Lutheran.... I asked an admissions staffer about how welcome God is in the classroom. The answer? Basically it depends on the professor.
  
  The financial aid seminar was well-attended and worthwhile. We were encouraged to grab a box lunch before heading to our next visit across the river, viz.,
  
  
• Carleton College, where we snuck into the info session after it had started. They don't have "merit aid" at Carleton -- they don't need it. I feel a little guilty thinking like that, but well, we're talking about a lot of money here. The academics at Carleton are definitely top-notch. Many (most?) graduates leave Carleton as published authors (I assume "...in peer-reviewed journals," but our tour guides did not say). We sat in on a history lecture with a professor who took his citizenship exams in Redwood City, California! Now I wish I'd had a history teacher like him when I was in junior high -- when "don't know much about hiss-toe-ree" could've been my middle name. Later, I could not remember seeing anyone non-white at the school, besides the assistant director of admissions who gave the presentation.

  That was it for Northfield; we drove back to the twin cities and had dinner with Jan, Britton, and a few of the kids (the ones who weren't fencing) at what's in effect a Chinese restaurant with a Vietnamese name. Our last evening in Minnesota.
  

• Tuesday morning 2/21 we packed up and got to Macalester college in time to not be totally left behind by the tour group. The language program is excellent there -- there are language houses where if you live there, you speak the language there. (Not sure how many hrs/day that applies or is enforced.) The 4-year grad rate is supposedly over 90% -- this would be a year-on-year retention of over 97.5%. The students are brilliant -- median SATs are 720 verbal, 710 math. The setting is really urban, I mean the campus borders on Snelling (a main drag), students don't need cars because they can take city buses -- this sort of thing. They gave us lunch tickets and I'll tell you, their cafeteria food is totally excellent.
  
  We sat in on a creative writing class with a prof who was very engaging/engaged with the students... the most enjoyable class we saw on this tour. I think it was 90 minutes but he had no problem keeping our attention. I don't know if they cherry-picked this class but there was an Egyptian lady, an African man, an African or Afro-American woman, at least one Asian-American - in a class of 16.

That was it basically. Our return flight home was basically without incident; we left MSP late but arrived at SFO a little early. But some of the gate hardware (jetway maybe?) was broken so they had to tow us to another gate -- so we got off the plane on-time rather than early.

So where will she go to school? Well, Calvin and Macalester were on her A-list before we started, and those are the ones still on her A-list afterwards. Now, about St John's College...

the younger teen's travels

I wasn't there on the younger teen's travels to Southeastern North America so I won't be able to give you as much of a report. But it was a Sojourn to the Past tour -- one of the Little Rock Nine traveled with them on this 9-day visit to some major sites of the Civil Rights movement. Near the end of her trip, our younger teen heard Rev. Shuttlesworth speak, and afterwards he sat at the table where she was. She asked, "How do you know when God is speaking to you?"

What a great question! And he answered, "It's like a mother, talking to her children." Wow.

The Parents' Travels

Yesterday the lovely Carol and I went to visit her mom. We left the house at about 8:30 and drove to Turlock. About 10:00 I gave her a call. "Hi Charlsey, it's Collin."

"Oh, are you coming to see me?" I told her we were, and that we'd visit for a bit, then go to a nursery and then to lunch. She thought that sounded fine.

"We'll be there in about half an hour," I told her. Twenty minutes later, we signed in and walked over to her room. She recognized us and remembered my name. After a while in her room, we headed off to the nursery, where she enjoyed looking at the flowers. Carol bought some flowers for our garden at home. Charlsey had a pretty good time. We left about 1pm, which was probably about long enough for all concerned. Although she probably forgot about the visit 15 minutes after we left, I know she enjoyed seeing the flowers, having a burger off-campus, and gettng that attention from us. Oh -- we also showed her some old photos and read some stuff from her travel journal, and a letter her sister had sent in 1958.

the following section rated PG

Afterwards, Carol and I went for a drive. We had a tent and a thermarest® pad in the car. The map showed a national wildlife refuge off highway 132, but when we got there, the signs were emphatic that nobody was allowed in! We drove on to some "S.V.R.A." which we found out, unhappily, means "where dirt bikes roar" -- not a place to pitch a tent for a peak kid-free outdoor afternoon experience. After some more driving, we came to Del Valle Regional Park, where the $6 entrance fee is far lower than any hourly motel rate. We pitched the tent in an unauthorized campsite under the shade of some beautiful trees, and....

Ah, Del Valle.

We drove to Palo Alto to look for the Apple Store -- which we found after much wandering around. I asked my question, then it was time to pick Jenny up from church. She had ridden her bike there to help with the K-1 class. We drove home, where Jenny asked me the embarrassing question of why there was a thermarest pad in the car. I tap-danced my way out of that one, mostly by not giving much of an answer. Luckily she didn't notice the tent I was putting away.

Well, that was probably more detail than you wanted. But it was fun for me to write anyway.

Even though I did spend over an hour on it.

what's exciting

Some time last week, I came home and asked the lovely Carol about her day.

She told me about talking with ______, who wasn't sure about her spiritual growth. Carol asked her a couple of things, and encouraged her about some things she'd seen, and ______ was much encouraged when they parted. There is something about this that I find very, ah, arousing. I mean I feel like skipping dinner and heading straight to the bedroom with her! I wondered if I was the only person who reacts like that.

But not any more. One of the kids brought home a copy of EATS SHOOTS AND LEAVES (by Lynne Truss). The author talks about the fellow who invented the modern comma, and writes: "... I hadn't heard of him until about a year ago, but am now absolutely kicking myself that I never volunteered to have his babies." So there you have it -- at least one other person experiences admiration in a, ah (Stop! Are you over 21? If not, stop here! Now!)
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in a sexualized way. Now, if you'll excuse me, the lovely Carol is going to take her shower. And I am going to supervise.