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Christian Ethics in the Sexual Wilderness

Helping your kids to the oasis may be more difficult than you think.

Recently I was asked if there was a theological agenda for youth ministry for the next decade. As I thought about the question, I realized how detached from the present concerns of young people theology has become. Theology deals with metaphysics, eschatology, doctrine, etc. It seldom addresses the most pressing concern of most young people--their sexuality. As youth struggle to make their way through what Vance Packard has called "the Sexual Wilderness," there seems to be little biblically-based theology to help them discern the meaning of their sexual lives and the "rightness" of their behavior.

The attempt to solve the puzzle of their sexuality is core to the psyche of all kids. Who they are, their sense of self-worth, their hopes for the future, and even their spiritual destinies are inexorably linked to their sexual struggles. Every other issue and concern is dwarfed by the phenomenon of their sexuality.

Have Things Changed All That Much?

Many would claim that the sexual scene is basically the same today as it has always been. Young people have always been troubled by sexual temptations, have always found the restrictions of the adult community oppressive, and have always been preoccupied with sexual concerns. However, there is something that has changed and changed dramatically--behavior. The revolution in sexual behavior among American youth is awesome to behold. While the church has maintained, for the most part, its traditional positions on sexual morality, the proportion of the teenage population violating those norms has increased significantly. At the same time, young people have continued to remain religiously committed. In fact, there is much evidence to suggest that their religious commitment may actually be intensifying. Consequently, the level of guilt in the teenage community has increased and, correspondingly, the emotional problems related to guilt. The intense religiosity of young people condemns the behavior that has become increasingly normative for them. It is therefore not surprising to discover that suicide, depression, self-hatred, and despair have become epidemic within the youth culture.

Peering through the Sexual Mist

It is difficult to get a clear picture of what is happening in the sexual lives of today’s kids. They certainly are behaving in ways that are very different from youth in the 1950’s. At the time of the famous Kinsey studies, approximately 14 percent of high school girls and 25 percent of high school boys had experienced sexual intercourse. The general estimate for high school teenagers in the 1980’s is that 43 percent of the girls and 47 percent of the boys experience sexual intercourse prior to graduation. It is interesting to note that the differential in statistics for girls in relationship to those for boys has significantly decreased, indicating the emergence of a new kind of sexual equality.

It is also interesting to note that while religious orientation influences the sexual behavior of young people, it does not make the enormous difference which you in youth ministry might expect. In studies made among those students in church-related colleges who considered themselves "very religious," it has been discovered that 31 percent of the girls and 39 percent of the boys have experienced sexual intercourse by the time of graduation from high school.

Another significant statistic for you who work with youth gives some indication of the behavior of those who do not engage in sexual intercourse but who, nevertheless, have extensive sexual experiences. Alfred Kinsey and his associates developed a special category for those whom they euphemistically called "technical virgins." Technical virgins, according to Kinsey, did not have sexual intercourse, but did experience petting that was intensive enough to stimulate orgasms. Of the kids who had not had sexual intercourse during their high school years, almost one-third fell into the category of "technical virgins."

Struggling To Find Biblical Norms

Most of the youth ministers I know are able to make a case against premarital sexual intercourse. Using biblical material related to fornication, they are able to legitimate the traditional religiously prescribed norms condemning coital activity prior to marriage. However, most say very little about premarital petting and seldom make a biblical case to govern the kind of sexual activity that, were it followed by coitus, could be labeled as "intensive foreplay." Some references might be made to Galatians 5 and its various descriptions of "the lusts of the flesh." But most youth ministers usually pass over the subject of heavy petting. It is an issue that is simply ignored. Yet "very religious" young people are certainly more likely to enter into this activity than those in the general population.

While they are unlikely to discuss the subject of petting, many youth ministers I know will discuss with kids the subject of masturbation. However, there seems to be no normative ethical position for these discussions. Some youth workers regard masturbation as a blessing from God which allows young people to relieve their sexual tensions without violating God’s requisites for celibacy prior to marriage. Others consider masturbation to be a sexual perversion that puts the practitioner in danger of eternal damnation. Most youth ministers simply accept the fact, without passing judgment on the practice, that kids masturbate.

Regardless of whether or not they view masturbation as acceptable behavior for their youth, most youth ministers have no idea of the pervasiveness of the practice. Studies on premarital sexual behavior indicate that well over 90 percent of males and 78 percent of females masturbate.

What discussions on masturbation often ignore altogether, however, is the role of fantasy in this activity. In actuality, fantasizing sexual intercourse while masturbating is almost a universal practice. With females, such fantasizing usually involves a person who is the object of love or infatuation. Males, however, are more likely than not to fantasize during masturbation about having intercourse with women whom they regard simply as sexual objects.

As you deal with the subject of masturbation, you should give some consideration to the fantasies that accompany the activity. Are such fantasies really fornication committed in the mind, and as such, just as condemnable as the act of fornication itself? Or, are these fantasies harmless sublimations of sexual tensions that must be released if spiritual and emotional well-being is to be maintained?

A hypothetical example may prove helpful. John is an evangelical Christian. He does not engage in the kind of promiscuous behavior that characterizes most of his high school peer group. However, John does masturbate. When he does so, he imagines that he is having sexual relations with Jane, a girl in his class. He does not date Jane nor is he interested in having a dating relationship with her. However, he does find her physically attractive and enjoys fantasizing having sexual intercourse with her. He experiences guilt over this behavior and, even though he has prayed for deliverance from the temptation to masturbate, he continually repeats the practice. Increasingly he is convinced that he is not a Christian because he believes that Christians have the spiritual strength to overcome the temptation to masturbate that he lacks.

Several important questions are raised by John’s dilemma. Is this fantasy sin? Is this fantasy an expression of sexism which regards a female as a sexual object rather than a person? Is John a Christian? What should you say to John if John confesses this behavior to you?

The Homosexual Dilemma

Perhaps the area in which youth ministers are most apt to feel inadequate in dealing with is homosexual activity and orientation. The traditional Pauline explanation of the causes of homosexual behavior is taken from the first chapter of Romans. There the Apostle Paul wrote of certain men and women who exhaust the gratifications of heterosexual activity and then degenerate into homosexual behavior as they seek new ways to satisfy their insatiable lusts.

It’s interesting to note that some Christian homosexuals cite this very passage to justify their behavior and orientation. They point out that Paul is condemning a heterosexual perversion, and that they are not heterosexual perverts. They claim their homosexual orientation is both natural and inborn.

However you happen to believe that the Christian faith views homosexual orientation and behavior, you should be aware that such behavior is not unusual. While as much as nine percent of the male population and five percent of the female population are homosexual (that represents almost 14,000,000 Americans), studies from Kinsey’s time up to present-day studies done by various researchers indicate that as many as 43 percent of the male population and 20 percent of the female population have had serious homosexual experiences at some time during their lives.

Guilt (or Lack Thereof)

Little research or theological reflection has been given to the emotional reactions of those who engage in various forms of sexual acts. Richard Masse has provided some help along these lines. His finds are, in some respects, surprising. He found that females were less likely than males to experience guilt after having premarital coitus. This, says Masse, is probably due to the fact that with females sexual intercourse is usually linked with a love relationship. The fact that the coital activity was with a loved person seemed to dramatically diminish guilt. Furthermore, Masse discovered that once a pattern of intense sexual relations is established, that pattern is seldom broken except through the termination of the relationship. In light of this, you may want to advise couples who have become sexually involved to temporarily end their relationship, with the hope that by breaking the pattern of repetitious "illicit" behavior, a new and more wholesome relationship between the two persons may be established in the future.

Kids who are religious and are also able to handle premarital coitus without guilt usually rationalize their behavior by saying, "We’re going to get married anyway." Most claim that they are already married in the eyes of God and that it is only recognition of their oneness by society that is lacking.

Your responses to such assertions require that you develop a theology of marriage that provides some basis for making judgments about this matter. There are many questions you must answer. When, according to Scripture, are people married? Is it when the ceremony takes place or when, as some claim, "the two become one flesh" (I..e. the act of sexual intercourse)?

The questions surrounding abortion are too numerous and controversial to be discussed here. However, some note should be taken of the fact that somewhere around 11 percent of female teenagers have abortions. The reason this figure is not higher is because the social stigma associated with having children out of wedlock has disappeared, and unmarried women are choosing to keep their children rather than putting them up for adoption or having them aborted before birth.

Our Challenge: Provide Answers

The theological questions related to sexuality beg for answers. Youth find the declarations of the church irrelevant or unrealistic as they struggle with issues related to their sexual identities. It is strange that in the face of such demands, many of us feel that the most pressing need is to come up with clever new ideas for our Sunday evening fellowship hour, or for our next social event. It is time for us to lead young people out of the sexual wilderness into a promised land where there is real meaning and direction for their sexual lives.

One fruitful avenue to be explored in this theological task can be found in a biblically-based perception of personhood. Instead of endeavoring to seek biblical texts that either condemn or affirm various kinds of sexual activities, it might prove more useful to explore how the Bible instructs kids to view those persons with whom they become romantically involved. Strange as it may seem to those of us in the evangelical tradition, Martin Buber, a Jewish existentialist philosopher, may provide some important assistance in such a venture.

An Answer: The "I-Thou" Relationship

Buber categorizes interpersonal relationships into two types. He believes that each person can have either an "I-It" relationship or an "I-Thou" relationship with another person. An "I-It" relationship is one in which the other person is treated as an object or a thing. The first person may look for rules that govern the actions that can be taken with regard to that "It." There even may be a rigid moral code controlling the interaction of the first (the "I") with the other person (the "It"), but the other person still is viewed as an object.

In an "I-Thou" relationship, the other person is viewed as a subject. The first person endeavors to empathize with the other person. There is an attempt to emotionally "enter into" the other person, to experience reality from the other person’s subjective stance, to feel the other person’s feelings as the encounter is occurring. The "I-Thou" relationship goes even more deeply than what can be explored by humanistic psychologists. Buber contends that in the "I-Thou" relationship, the first person senses that in the encounter, there is an experience of a transcendental dimension in the personhood of the other. God is experienced! God is encountered! There is a way of relating to another person, says Buber, in which one is surprised by the awareness that he or she is not only relating to a temporal human being, but also to that which is eternal, divine, and infinite.

Buber makes no apology for the obvious mystical quality of the "I-Thou" relationship which he attempts to describe, but which he believes is beyond verbal expression. He boldly claims that in every human encounter, there is the possibility for the discerning spiritual person to encounter God. Behind every temporal thou, says Buber, there waits the Eternal Thou.

Buber’s interpretation of what is waiting to be encountered in the other is paralleled and supported by biblical revelation. In the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew, Jesus invites each of us to recognize that He is personally waiting to be encountered in the persons that we meet in our day-to-day experiences. When Jesus declared "inasmuch as ye have done it to the least of these, my brothers, ye have done it unto me," He laid a basis for acknowledging that The Sacred Presence is waiting for discovery in our relationships with others.

Other biblical passages can also be employed to develop the case for the claim that every human encounter holds the potentiality for divine encounter. Passages such as John 1:4 ("In Him was life, and the life was the light of men") and passages in which we are referred to as temples in which God dwells (e.g. Acts 7:48; 17:28) richly support the affirmation that the presence of Jesus is waiting to be met in the other.

"I-Thou" Sexuality

Such a theology of personhood has tremendous implications for sexual interaction. If the "other person" in a romantic relationship is viewed as a mystical incarnation of God, then there will be reverence and respect in what is said and done. Exploitation of that person for the purpose of sexual gratification will be out of the question. All that the first person does with or to the other will be for the purpose of lifting up and enhancing the other. Anything that would cheapen or diminish the dignity and worth of the other must be shunned. Sexual interaction suddenly possesses a sacred dimension which prescribes how persons should relate to each other.

Too often, the "other person" has been treated as an "It." One can use a thing, exploit an object, and manipulate an "It" for one’s own satisfaction. When the other is recognized as a medium for the encounter with The Eternal Thou, however, everything changes. The exploration of the nature of these changes provides a solid basis for the relevant theology you will need to develop to bring the power of a Christian view of sexuality and sexual behavior into your kids’ hearts and lives.

Tony Campolo is chairman of the Sociology Department at Eastern College in St. Davids, Pennsylvania. He is also the author of several books, including Ideas for Social Action (Youth Specialties/Zondervan).